New reality TV show to auction virgins

MELBOURNE: A Melbourne filmmaker has come up with the idea of a new reality TV show to auction off male and female virgins. The show will then be made into a documentary. 

Justin Sisely has spent more than a year recruiting male and female virgins willing to auction themselves on camera. The "auditions" were held with posters calling for "Virgins Wanted" over an image of the Virgin Mary. The show will be filmed in US instead of Australia, as he will face prostitution charges there. The auction will take place in a brothel in Nevada, 'sin-city' Las Vegas. 

Sisely will pay each virgin $20,000 and they will also receive 90% of the sale price, with the remaining 10 % going to the Nevada brothel where the auction will be held. Before the final auction, bids will be placed online. 

Sisely said virgins previously selected had left the project and he was forced to find others willing to sell themselves. Each virgin will earn $20,000 in addition to 90% of the sale price, with the remaining 10% going to the Nevada brothel. 

"The hardest part is telling the parents, they hate me," News.com.au quoted Sisely as saying. The participants had agreed to do the show mostly for the money. Like a 21-year-old from Sydney, who uses the pseudonym Veronica, said she signed up to the controversial project to earn money and to change perceptions about sex. 

"Technically I"m selling my virginity for money, technically that would be classified as prostitution, but it"s not going to be a regular thing, so in my head I can justify that I"m not going to be a prostitute," she said. Another fellow 'John' said, "Money is a good incentive but I"m really more excited about the journey I"m about to go on." 

The project has enraged many, with Family First Senator Steve Fielding branding it "absurd, ridiculous and disgusting".

ANI, May 11, 2010

Fighting their way to the bottom in India

- Amelia Gentleman, International Herald Tribune (June 1, 2008)

NEW DELHI: A fight for the right to be downwardly mobile exploded this week in north India, as a powerful community of Indian shepherds asserted that the best way to rise up in modern society was to take a step down in the regimented class hierarchy.

"Untouchability is not just social discrimination. It is a blot on humanity," - Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh

Tension over the still-rigid caste classifications, which underpin the Indian social system, spilled over into riots across the state of Rajasthan, with at least 23 people killed during clashes with the police. By Friday evening, protests had spread to the outskirts of the capital, New Delhi.

This was not the usual show of anger at the ever-prevalent discrimination faced by members of lower-caste groups. Instead, it stemmed from controversy over a demand from the Gujjar community of farmers and shepherds to have their low caste status officially downgraded, relegating them to the bottom classification in the caste ladder.

If Gujjars were to be shunted into the Scheduled Caste category, a classification that includes Dalits (once known as untouchables) and tribal communities, they would qualify for greater privileges under India's affirmative action program, which was designed to lift up those groups that for centuries were viewed as "pollutants," ostracized by mainstream society and prevented from accumulating wealth.

Quotas of university places and lucrative government positions are reserved for members of the Scheduled Castes under the system that was created when India became independent 60 years ago. Although the Gujjar caste is also eligible for some privileges because of its position in the second-from-bottom grouping - known in bureaucratic lexicon as Other Backward Classes - its leaders point out that members would enjoy much better preferential treatment if it were demoted to the lowest rung.

Sachin Pilot, the Congress Party member of Parliament for the region where six people were killed by police gunfire Tuesday and a member of the Gujjar caste, said as many as 70,000 protesters were still blocking the road out of Jaipur.

"Most people don't realize that India's new economic prosperity is not shared by the vast majority," he said in a telephone interview.

"The Gujjars feel they have been very deprived. Access to quotas would give the community a sense of hope."

Frustrated at the state government's refusal to meet their demand, thousands of Gujjars blockaded the national highways around the state capital of Jaipur, known as the pink city, on Tuesday. The protests brought the state of Rajasthan, much loved by tourists, to a virtual standstill all week. Vehicles were prevented from traveling on to Agra and the Taj Mahal. Thousands of trucks were stuck for several days by the blockades, tourist trains were canceled and government vehicles scorched.

Government buildings were attacked in one Rajasthan town Friday, prompting the authorities to issue a shoot-on-sight order.

Thirteen people were shot and killed by the police Tuesday, Indian media reported, as officers tried to disperse crowds that had gathered to shut off the national highway. Two more were killed by the police Thursday, Reuters reported.

"Let a hundred people die," Colonel Kirori Singh Baisala, one of the Gujjar leaders, told The Times of India on Thursday. "But we are clear in our objectives. We have suffered enough and would not go back until we get the Scheduled Caste status."

Kalu Lal Gurjar, a member of the caste and a minister in the Rajasthan government who is supporting the protesters, said that the Indian government had promised to reclassify the group as a Scheduled Caste in 1964. "At that time, there was opposition from within the Gujjar community itself, because they thought that it would be demeaning to be associated with the Scheduled Castes," he said in a telephone interview Friday.

Later, when the material benefits of being consigned to the bottom of the ladder became more obvious, the mood changed. "The community has been agitating since 1980s for inclusion," he said.

The debate over India's affirmative action policy hovers constantly at the top of the political agenda. The Hindu concept of untouchability was abolished in 1950, but the centuries-old caste system, and the deep-rooted prejudices that go with it, remains.

In rural India, Dalits are frequently prevented from sharing the same water pump as the rest of the village. Even in middle-class urban India, where the divisions are less obvious, people will often inquire indirectly for clues of caste membership on first meeting, putting together details of surname, origin and father's profession to make a mental classification.

For some the oppression is so intolerable that they abandon the religion altogether. Last Sunday, several thousand Dalits and tribal Indians converted en masse to Buddhism in a ceremony in Mumbai, to escape their position at the bottom of the social pile.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh recently compared India's caste system to South Africa under apartheid. "Untouchability is not just social discrimination. It is a blot on humanity," he said. But his government's programs for eliminating the problem have proved as controversial and as unsuccessful as those begun by his predecessors.

India has more than 6,000 castes and subcastes, 3,743 of which are designated "backward" on the grounds of social and educational deprivation. Scheduled castes represent around 25 percent of the total population. Designed originally to abolish caste divisions by helping the Dalits and tribal communities to escape destitution, the quota system was expanded in the early 1990s to assist the Other Backward Classes, those who were less well placed in the ancient hierarchy.

Opponents of the expanded quota system argue that instead of eliminating caste consciousness, it has further entrenched it, making society more aware of divisions and more resentful of rival castes.

The caste tension sparked by the Gujjar protest illustrates the depth of inter-caste hostility, intensified by the fierce competition for government quotas, analysts say. The Meenas, another Rajasthan community ranked in the Scheduled Caste bracket, have started a counterprotest against the Gujjars, concerned that their share of the pie would be diminished if the Gujjars were to be reclassified.

Four people were killed in clashes between the communities on Friday, officials said.

The demands of the Gujjar caste have been condemned by some as "cynical." "It's about milking the system," said Dipankar Gupta, a sociologist and expert on caste, adding that the Gujjar community had never been "brutalized or pushed down" as Dalits had.

This kind of "political maneuver" was the inevitable consequence of the government's affirmative action policy, he said. "If you play the caste game, you will end up with caste war. Because of the government intervention, these identities have become heightened."

Chandrabhan Prasad, a Dalit newspaper columnist, said: "There is no basis for reclassification. Gujjars are low caste, not outcasts. They have always been part of the mainstream, unlike the Dalits, who were rejected as pollutants and excluded from the rest of society."

Wolf whistle works, woman strips

WELLINGTON (Reuters) - Road workers in a small New Zealand town got their wish granted when a woman stripped saying she was fed up with their wolf-whistles.

The Israeli tourist was about to use an ATM in the main street of Kerikeri, in the far north of the country, when the men whistled, the New Zealand Press Association reported.

She calmly stripped off, used the cash machine, before getting dressed and walking away.

The woman told police she didn't take too kindly to the whistling from the men repairing the road.

"She said she had thought 'bugger them, I'll show them what I've got'," Police Sergeant Peter Masters told NZPA.

"She gave the explanation that she had been ... pestered by New Zealand men. She's not an unattractive looking lady," Masters said.

"She was taken back to the police station and spoken to and told that was inappropriate in New Zealand."

(Reporting by Adrian Bathgate; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)

Women's Beauty, Men's Wealth Key to Romance

(HealthDay News) -- If you only have five minutes to pick a mate, you're likely to do it the way your ancestors did, with men seeking beauty and women looking for security, wealth and commitment.

It's an ancient formula but one still very much in play in modern "speed dating," said researchers reporting in the current Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"Evolutionary theories in psychology suggest that men and women should trade off different traits in each other, and when we look at the actual mate choices people make, this is what we find evidence for," researcher Peter Todd, cognitive scientist at Indiana University, said in a prepared statement. "Ancestral individuals who made their mate choices in this way -- women trading off their attractiveness for higher quality men and men looking for any attractive women who will accept them -- would have had an evolutionary advantage in greater numbers of successful offspring."

Speed dating involves sessions in which men and women have numerous "mini dates" with up to 30 different people, each date lasting anywhere from three to five minutes.

The research team used data from 46 adults in a speed-dating session in Germany to compare what people said they wanted in a mate with the qualities of the people they actually chose.

The study participants were asked to fill out a questionnaire before the session assessing themselves and their ideal mate according to traits such as physical attractiveness, present and future financial status, health and parenting qualities. According to the researchers, these traits are relevant to the evolution of the human species.

After every date, the participants were asked to note whether they would like to see the other person again.

Most people reported they wanted to find someone who was similar to themselves. However, once the session began, men demonstrated more interest in attractive women, while women targeted measures of wealth and security in proportion to how attractive they believed themselves to be.

In support of the notion that women are the choosier half of the species, women indicated they wanted to see every third potential mate, but men were open to seeing every second woman again.

Todd and his colleagues noted that among mammals, females are widely known to be more picky.

While the results were not surprising, the study showed the utility of using speed dating for research, the researchers wrote.

"Speed dating lets us look at a large number of mate choice decisions collected in a short amount of time," Todd said. "It only captures the initial stage of the extended process involved in long-term mate choice. But that initial expression of interest is crucial for launching everything else."

Men No Pause - Father at age 90 ?

My first hint came from watching an MTV Cribs featuring Hugh Hefner, where they guy aged 70+ years has a kid who is in his teens. So came the thought in my brain - What age until when a man is still fertile ??

I asked a Dr who told me there is age is no factor for men's fertility, only age. Well, here is a scoop I found in this thought process..

Today's newspaper talks about Nanu Ram Jogi, a 90 year old Indian whose wife bore him a baby!! And this child is indeed, his own!!

Jogi married his own daughter in law when his son died, leaving a young widow. In rural India, a young widow finds herself on the edge of being socially ostracized, and Jogi didn't want her to suffer. This act has led to him fathering a child with a girl 60 years younger to him.

Not commenting on the state of affairs in rural India pertaining to social laws, I keep myself to only happily wondering at the age of men's fertility. Hmmm.. and at 28, people are telling me I should get married and have kids asap, or it'll be too late. Is it, really, is it? :)

Falling in Love is Not Good for Your Health

HMM.. Does someone realise, that this Prof. Martin Cowie, is actually spending money and time on this.. Someone give him something better to do !

Love is said to be the most blissful experience for an individual, but this constellation of emotions is not that pleasurable when it comes to health.

A new research has suggested that being in love does make people sick and unwell.

According to researchers at Imperial College London, the highs and lows of romance cause a range of physical reactions like dilation of eyes, sweating of palms and increase in heart rate.

"Love has some obvious physical effects," the Telegraph quoted Professor Martin Cowie, as saying.

"Pupils dilate, palms become sweaty and the heart rate increases. Large amounts of adrenaline are running through our system which does cause problems," he added.

Cowie says that stress related illnesses at work cropped up from near-identical physical phenomena.

"We have seen a big rise in people complaining of flu-like symptoms over a long period of time," he said.

He added that the helplessness to acknowledge the effects of emotion on our health makes things worse.

"If people are suffering from emotional problems, they need to acknowledge the effect on their health. There is a feeling that talking about emotions somehow makes you weak, but there is a real link between emotions and health.

Prof Cowie, who has been studying the effect of emotions on humans, added that there is evidence that the loss of love can increase the risk of heart problems and death.

"We know, for instance, that newly widowed men have a 50 percent higher chance of serious heart problems," Cowie said.

Source-ANI

Women Prefers Men With Soft Features, as Life Partners, Than a Macho

Macho men may be gorgeous and nice to hang around with, but women do not prefer them as long-time love, a new study has revealed.

Psychologists from Durham and St Andrews Universities found that men with feminine facial features are seen as more committed and less likely to cheat on their partners.

The researchers asked over 400 British men and women to judge digitally altered pictures of male faces made to look more masculine or feminine. The participants were asked to predict personality traits including sexual behaviour and parenting skills based on what they saw.

Men with masculine faces, with features such as a square jaw, larger nose and smaller eyes, were classed as significantly more dominant, less faithful, worse parents and as having personalities that were less warm, compared to their 'feminine' counterparts, who had finer facial features with fuller lips, wide eyes and thinner, more curved eyebrows.

The scientists say the research backs up earlier study about masculinity and perceptions of personality and gives further insight into what people see in others when choosing potential partners. It will also advance studies in areas like evolutionary biology, fertility and genetics and offer new insights for relationship counselling and psychology.

"This research shows a high amount of agreement between women about what they see, personality wise, when asked to 'judge a book by its cover,'" Lead author, Dr Lynda Boothroyd, a lecturer with Durham University's Department of Psychology, commented.

"They may well use that impression of someone to decide whether or not to engage with that person. That decision-making process all depends on what a woman is looking for in a relationship at that time of her life."

The study asked participants to complete a web-based test. Pairs of pictures which only showed the face without any hair, ears, neck, shoulders or clothing visible, were presented side by side. The participants were asked to select which face they thought was more of a particular trait and how much more so by clicking on a point of the scale. Traits selected for judgement were dominance, ambition, wealth, faithfulness, commitment, parenting, and warmth.

The survey also found that faces which appeared healthier, for instance those with better complexion, were seen as more desirable in terms of all personality traits compared to those who looked unhealthy. Similarly, older faces were generally viewed more positively compared to younger ones.

"Our research also found that it is men's health that conveys all round good qualities for partnership and personality. Our results contradict claims that machismo denotes fitness and disease immunity. Masculinity may buy you dominance but not necessarily tip top physical condition. Instead women see a healthy guy as the source of wealth, and fit for family life," Professor David Perrett from St Andrews University added.

Source-ANI

Parents Bank Kids' Umbilical Cord Blood

Flyers in upscale doctors' offices portray it as the hot new baby-shower gift: a registry where friends and family chip in almost $2,000 to start privately banking a newborn's umbilical cord blood, just in case of future illness.

 

That idea of biological insurance is a long shot that most mothers-to-be can safely ignore, say new guidelines from the nation's pediatricians that urge more parents to donate their babies' cord blood - so that it might save someone's life today.

 

The guidelines come as the government begins setting up the first national cord-blood banking system, aiming to prevent some 12,000 deaths a year - if public banks can compete with marketing-savvy private companies that now house the bulk of the world's preserved cord blood.

 

Cord blood is rich in stem cells, the building blocks that produce blood - and the same stem cells that make up the bone-marrow transplants that help many people survive certain cancers and other diseases. But cord blood has some advantages: These younger stem cells are more easily transplanted into unrelated people than bone marrow is, and they can be thawed at a moment's notice, much easier than searching out a bone-marrow donor.

 

There should be plenty for both private and public banking, says an optimistic Dr. Elizabeth Shpall of the public M.D. Anderson Cord Blood Bank. After all, cord blood from most of the nation's 4 million annual births is thrown away.

 

Chief hurdles: Improving consumer awareness - and the small number of hospitals that allow donations.

 

Her own work illustrates the industry's stark socio-economic contrasts: At Houston's Ben Taub General Hospital, Shpall finds the mostly Hispanic mothers-to-be not only unable to afford private banking - few have even heard that cord blood has a medical use.

 

Armed with a $3 million federal grant to improve much-needed minority donations, she is working with Spanish-language TV and radio programs that in a few months will begin telling Houston moms about their cord blood choices, and which hospitals allow donations.

 

Her message: "Unless you have a family member with cancer, it's unlikely you would ever need it, and you would be doing a service to humanity to donate it."

 

Today, about 50,000 cord blood donations are stored in more than 20 public banks around the country. The new National Cord Blood Inventory aims to triple that number, enough that virtually anyone who needs stem cell treatment could find a match - especially minority patients who today seldom can as most bone marrow donors are white

 

Private banks have an estimated 400,000 units stored.

 

What's the controversy? Deciding who really needs to store a child's own cord blood for later use. Private storage costs $1,500 to $1,900 up front, and about $125 a year thereafter, although some offer special programs for lower-income families.

 

Guidelines published last month by the American Academy of Pediatrics say:

 

-Parents should consider private storage only if an older sibling has cancer or certain genetic diseases that cord blood is proven to treat.

 

-Everyone else should consider donating their child's cord blood. The odds that a child would need an infusion of his or her own cord blood later in life are slim, between one in 1,000 and one in 200,000.

 

Private banks vehemently disagree, arguing that as scientists learn more about stem cells, the blood could create personalized treatments for heart disease or other more common killers.

 

"That's still considered very experimental," counters Dr. Mitchell Cairo of Columbia University Medical Center, who co-authored the new guidelines.

 

Also, doctors don't even know if cord blood remains usable after being stored for decades.

 

Still, last month Illinois doctors reported the first apparent success in treating a child's leukemia with her own cord blood - something usually impossible because that blood so often carries the cancer-triggering genetic defect.

 

The report has expectant parents calling Advocate Hope Children's Hospital to ask if they, too, should store their babies' cord blood, says Dr. Ammar Hayani, who performed the transplant only after genetic testing showed that patient's cord blood was defect-free.

 

"It's probably overadvertised by some of these companies as this biological insurance. That's probably overdramatization of its potential," says Hayani, who advises parents of the pediatric academy's guidelines. "But I think parents need to know" both sides' arguments, he says.

 

About 11 states have recently passed legislation to try to increase the information that expectant parents receive about their cord blood choices: store it, donate it, or discard it.

 

It's no different than how families choose between public or private schools, says Steve Grant of Cord Blood Registry, which began offering the baby-gift option last year after noticing grandparents putting up the money.

 

"The competitive nature seems misplaced to me," he says. "Family banking is not in any way detracting from the ability to build a public system."

 

-- Lauran Neergaard covers health and medical issues for The Associated Press in Washington.

For the New Year...

 FOR THE NEW YEAR...

 

 I Came To The Teacher

 With A Trembling Heart

 My Task Undone.

 Teacher, Can I Have Another Page,

 I've Spoilt This One.

 He Looked At Me And Smiled.

 He Took The Old Page, Stained And Blotted,

 And Gave Me A New One,

 Clean And Unspotted,

 And Unto My Sad Face Smiled,

 Do Better Next Time, My Child.

 

 I Came To The Throne

 With A Quivering Lip,

 My Task Undone.

 The Whole Year Gone, Lord,

 Can I Have Another,

 I've Spoilt This One.

 He Looked At Me And Smiled.

 He Took The Old Year, Stained And Blotted,

 And Gave Me A New One,

 Clean And Unspotted,

 And Unto My Sad Face Smiled,

 Do Better Next Time, My Child.

 

- Bob Andrews, Network Marketing Multibillionaire

 

 A VERY HAPPY AND PROSPEROUS 2007 TO YOU !!!

 

Phalgun Kumar

Modern Business Solutions

 

+91-9227220801

 

Ground Floor Raja Complex,

Vijay Cross Roads,

Navrangpura, Ahmedabad,

Gujarat, India.

Richard Branson: The rebel billionaire

******
Branson is one of my most admired persons. I relate to the way he treats his life.. something that should be lived fully, and never without risks, and never with satisfaction. This new article about his yet new ventures and as always.. larger than life!! - Phalgun.
******

Tara Weiss, Forbes

December 02, 2006

Sir Richard Branson is just as well known for his wild antics as he is for being a brilliant entrepreneur. He has dressed as a bride to publicize his wedding stores, Virgin Bride. Plus, he's attempted to fly around the world in a hot-air balloon and starred in his own reality TV show, The Rebel Billionaire. His reputation is more stuntman than elder statesman.

That changed last September. After a philanthropy-filled summer that saw major donations by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, Branson capped the season with an announcement of his own. At Bill Clinton's Global Initiative in New York, Branson pledged all proceeds from Virgin Group's transportation divisions be donated to develop alternative fuel sources and alleviate global warming. His pledge amounts to about $3 billion over ten years.

It's an intriguing move for someone whose companies are largely propelled by fossil fuels. Branson's theory: Giving up profits might be painful in the short term, but in the long-run it can revolutionize business and save the world. "There is a blurring taking place between the for-profit and non-profit," says Aron Cramer, CEO of Business for Social Responsibility. "Social enterprise uses market forces to achieve business value and social value in blended way."

Branson didn't even believe in global warming until five years ago. Then he read Bjorn Lomborg's, The Skeptical Environmentalist. In typical Branson style, once he was convinced, it was full steam ahead. He created Virgin Unite, the independent charitable arm of his company, in 2004. Branson's new non-profit focuses, in part, on finding an alternative fuel source. There's also a Branson School of Entrepreneurship in Johannesburg, which is a partnership with CIDA, a free South African university. Another arm matches social entrepreneurs with the neediest communities.

His activities spurred a visit from former Vice President Al Gore. It was during that visit to Branson's London home that Gore told him that he's in a position to do something big. That's a concept Branson understands. "Hopefully, by business leaders getting out there and making these gestures we'll inspire others to do the same thing," he says.

This summer he convened an informal meeting of world leaders on his own island, located in the British Virgin Islands. He's very matter-of-fact when he says that Jimmy Carter, Desmond Tutu and "the two guys from Google," Larry Page and Sergey Brin, were there. Says Branson: "I've been getting together with interesting leaders from around the world to debate some of the bigger issues like global warming, AIDS and conflict resolution issues to see if there's a way some of the elders in the world can help address the problems. We had some interesting debates about it."

He knows he can't do it alone. In addition to donating profits to alleviate global warming, Branson's also seeding other charities. His most recent: Sara Blakely Foundation. Blakely, the founder of the pantyhose company Spanx, became one of his prot�g�s when she was a contestant on The Rebel Billionaire.

The show was a flop, and Blakely didn't win the show's prize, a job with Branson. But she clearly got his attention. In October, Branson gave her his $750,000 paycheck from the television show to start her foundation, which will focus on funding education and entrepreneurship for women globally.

Just before The Blakely Foundation's launch at Atlanta's Ritz Carlton, Forbes.com spoke with Branson. While he was characteristically dressed in jeans and an untucked shirt, Sir Richard Branson was atypically serious. He exuded less goofiness and more gravitas as he discussed the changing world of philanthropy, celebrity studded charity and whether corporate social responsibility was more than just marketing.

First off, what was it about The Blakely Foundation that made you fork over your $750,000 paycheck from Fox?

From day one I realized what a spunky girl she was. I knew she had a fear of heights, so I took her 10,000 feet up in a hot-air balloon, made her climb a 150-foot rope ladder to the top of it and then made her have a cup of tea with me. She didn't overcome her fear of heights, but she had the courage to do it. She stood out. She's also full of good ideas, she really cares about people, and she's putting that energy into doing a lot of good things.

There are so many problems in the world and one way to overcome them is to empower women. Men are interested in wars and armies and digging for oil. The women have children and that makes them very important teachers.

Is the prospect of turning over so much profit to finding an alternative energy source at all scary? Is this part of your generation's mark on society?

The generation brought up in the 60s definitely has more of a social conscience than previous generations. And if you're one of those fortunate people to become extremely wealthy you have a responsibility to utilize that wealth constructively. What you shouldn't do is leave that money languishing in a bank. What you shouldn't do is compete to have the biggest yacht or private plane. I think people will get far more satisfaction from making a real difference. Besides, once you've had your breakfast, lunch and dinner; you can only live in one kitchen and drive one car at a time.

Why is there a critical mass of business leaders and celebrities involved in social enterprise right now?

There are a lot of problems in the world now which in previous generations were not as apparent. You can travel faster and more easily. During my travels I've spent a lot of time in African hospitals. I've seen waiting rooms full of people waiting for other people to die in their hospital beds so they can be the next people to get in those beds and die.

Because of air travel you get out and see these situations. If you're in a position to do something about it you can't just turn your back on it. I suspect that our generation has traveled more and seen more of these issues first hand. It's easier to turn your back on things if you can't see them.
One of the reasons I made the gesture at the Clinton gathering is to get people to think--particularly people in dirty businesses like travel and coal and oil.

Celebrities, politicians and business people seem like strange bedfellows. Are they?

Entrepreneurs and business people are going to make the difference more than politicians. On global warming we desperately need politicians to work with the business community. Arnold Schwarzenegger is giving a good lead in California bringing in bills to speed up alternative energy.

We're going to practically attack our own industry with the announcement I made at CGI. Hopefully the paradoxical idea of someone in the transportation business making a statement like we made will inspire others.

As for politicians, Bush needs to be a leader on this. He still has time to embrace global warming. If he did that, all the damage that has been done in other aspects of his time in office could be overcome by him acknowledging that the world has a problem. Given where he and his vice president have made their money is all the more reason he should do something bold. He must be searching for a legacy.

Is this push by business leaders about altruism or marketing?

There's no one reason for people doing things. I've always said that I want to build the most respected brand in the world, and if we can send people into space in an environmentally friendly space craft that will help enhance our brand [and] if we can invent an alternative fuel that tackles global warming, that is more effective than ethanol and can one day can be used in airplanes that'll enhance our brand and tackle global warming--it'll enable me to sleep better at night.